Mario Meets Einstein
by AllHailMario
Summary: Prof. E. Gadd's time machine...Mario...and Einstein...when things go haywire with the time machine, Mario winds up back in time with Einstein! Read along as Mario tries to find his way back to the future.
1. Chapter 1: The Time Machine

Ah...the Mushroom Kingdom...a place of such sweet grace...where the butterflies fly...and the Goombas are squashed...in elegance...

RIIIING!!

Mario let the alarm clock ring another time before slowly taking the hammer off of his bedside table and smashing it to pieces. He brushed the broken pieces of metal and wires into a pile on the other side of the table the clock had once sat on, where the pieces fell into a million other smashed bits of metal.

"You know, Mario," Luigi said groggily from the upper bunk, "you don't have to use an alarm clock. It's better for the both of us and it saves us money."

"Having an alarm clock is fun. That pile over there is my pride and joy."

Luigi muttered a few words nobody understood and was snoring again within a few seconds. Mario put his hammer away and put his legs over the bed, letting his eyes adjust to the light. When he was used to it, he took a shower, brushed his teeth, and shook Luigi awake.

"Will you stop it, Mario!? It's six in the morning!"

Mario checked his watch, then said, "Had you actually looked at the time, you'd discover that it's actually 10:00. And I mean PM."

Without lifting his head, Luigi snatched Mario's watch off and looked at the watch. "Nice try, bro," he said, handing the watch back to him and showing him that it clearly stated 10:00 AM.

"Just get up!" Mario shouted.

To make a very, very, very long story short, Mario eventually got Luigi up (it was now 11:30 AM). Luigi took his own shower and brushed his own teeth (who else's teeth would he brush?), then sat down with Mario in front of their house.

"Remember what day it is today, Weege?" Mario asked, calling Luigi by his nickname.

"Monday."

"Besides that."

"It's a sunny day."

"We had plans for something, Weege."

"To stay in bed all day."

"Shut up. Everybody has to get up sometime. We're going to a friend's place as some sort of a field trip. Who is it?"

"Peach. Who else?"

"Is your memory honestly that bad? He's an elderly man..."

"Toadsworth."

"You're not even trying, Luigi. He makes lots of machines..."

Luigi thought for a bit, then threw his hands up (no, he did not puke them). "Fine. I can think of nothing similar. Prof. Gadd."

"So you were intentionally messing with me?" Luigi nodded. "Well, whatever. Yes, we are going to Elvin's place. See what the good professor's up to. Pack a snack, Luigi, 'cause we're leaving in a few minutes."

Mario and Luigi stood in front of a small, shabby place that served as the professor's home. Mario was about to knock when he heard an unfinished, "Oh--," before an explosion shook the house. Mario hesitated, eyeing the smoke pouring out around the crevices of the door, then knocked three times.

After a few coughs, the door opened, letting more smoke empty out. Prof. Gadd rubbed his glasses to clear them, then glanced up at the pair. "Luigi!" he exclaimed happily. "And Mario! Nice to see you again! Come on i--whoops, hang on." After wandering back inside, turning on a machine, and having the smoke quickly get sucked into the machine, the small professor came back out again. "Sorry, not nice to bring guests into a smoky house. NOW you may come on in."

Mario glanced around to make sure nothing else was going to explode, then slipped inside. Luigi followed suit. Mario looked around at all the whacky devices the professor now had littered around the place. He saw a hamster in a cage that was connected to a bright-red machine.

"That," Prof. Gadd explained happily, "is a recent invention. The hamster runs on the wheel, which powers a machine that creates tar."

"Tar?"

"I'll change it to something like jawbreakers soon, but that's for a later time."

Luigi walked over to a large machine in the middle of the floor that was probably being worked on when the Mario Brothers had entered in. "What's this?"

"I was working on that when you two came in. Far from finished and has a few flaws, which should explain all the smoke a few seconds ago. It is a very basic time machine."

Mario could tell Luigi was thinking about where he would want to go.

"But," Prof. Gadd continued, "it only works when you inject your DNA into this little slot over here--" He motioned over to a hole on the side of the machine-- "and even then, it can only transport you to the time and location of a relative, however distant, up to three generations ago. And furthermore, it can only hold five DNA samples at a time." He sighed. "It needs work, but I feel that once I am finished, it will be quite the work of art!"

Mario nodded. He looked around the place more and noticed a piece of paper on a wall. When he looked closer, he realized it was a family tree of Elvin Gadd's (E. Gadd's) family. He scanned his eyes over it briefly, but one name caught his eye. Einstein. E. Gadd was Einstein's distant second nephew-in-law, if that was even real. Mario had no idea how they were related, since he had no idea how family tree charts worked all that much.

"I have already had my own DNA injected," E. Gadd continued to explain. "I've always wanted to meet a few of my relatives. And then I--"

As Mario relaxed and listened to the professor, he leaned against the time machine and accidentally pushed a lever. Light burst out of the machine, and Mario whirled around, his hand accidentally hitting a button that said "Elvin Gadd" on it, then tripping and hitting his head against the button that said "Albert Einstein." Unable to get up in time, Mario's luck totally ended when his molecules dissolved and transported to another time.


	2. Chapter 2: Mario Meets Einstein

Mario flailed his arms and legs wildly, not aware of what was going on. All he understood was that the time machine had vaporized him and reformed him sometime in the past. He had dropped out of the air and had not opened his eyes to see that he was already on the ground. When he finally did peek one open, he stopped his flailing, sat up, and looked around.

"Umm...where am I?"

Mario looked around and saw that he was in some sort of forested area. When he looked behind him, he saw a shack that looked familiar to E. Gadd's. Maybe he hadn't gone back in time, after all. He stood up and walked into the house to see...

"Ah! Who are you!?"

Mario took a closer look at the man. He had extremely unkempt white hair and a white mustache. He had dark circles under his eyes after staying up all night working on some new invention.

"You're Einstein, aren't you?"

"Pardon me, sorry! Always I am mistaken for Prof. Einstein."

Mario looked even closer. "Yes, you are Einstein. I know it. Listen, I'm not here to tour your sh...uh, house, or ask for your autograph, or ask you to prove a theory. I came here from the future, odd as that seems, and I need to know how to get back."

"I never think of the future. It comes soon enough."

"Not mine, it doesn't!" Mario shouted. "I'm a hundred years in the future! I'll be dead by the time I find Luigi again!"

Mario sat down on the ground and sighed. How could he have gone back in time? How could he have hit a button exactly, pulled a lever exactly, and wound up where he was now via an unfinished time machine? It was almost as if some stupid author was writing everything up. Surely that sort of thing couldn't happen in real life.

"I have never met this fellow Luigi," Einstein said to Mario, "but I can assure you he is fine."

"I am not fine!" Luigi responded to Prof. Gadd. "My brother just got sucked into another time! I may never see my older brother again!" Shaking the professor violently by his shoulders, Luigi shouted, "Fix it!"

"I can't!" Prof. Gadd said. Luigi released him. "As a matter of fact, I don't even know how the time machine worked. It never worked on any of the test subjects. He pressed the buttons and levers in the right sequence, I can assure you that, but I don't know how it works. In fact, I haven't developed a way to bring anyone back..."

Luigi knew this already, but all the same he nearly fainted at the answer. "Please, get cracking! We need to bring him back!"

Mario sat slumped in a chair beside a table in Einstein's house. Einstein offered him a cup of tea, which Mario accepted despite the fact that he didn't like tea much. He sipped it, spat it out when it scalded his tongue, and apologized to Einstein.

"Sorry. Hot."

Einstein said nothing, but simply set the teapot back down and sat down in a chair of his own. "You say you came from the future. I have heard of this thing spoken many times in tales, but never have I been able to comprehend something as scientifically advanced as a time machine."

Mario carefully sipped some more of the tea, then set it down and replied. "Some distant future relative of yours named Elvin Gadd created a time machine--beats me how he did it--and I accidentally fell in, activated it, and wound up here. That's it in a nutshell." Mario sighed again. "And to top it all off, I don't think either of us has any knowledge at all as how to get me back."

"Imagination is more important than knowledge."

"Not when you're stuck in the 1800s!"

"The year is 1947."

Mario was about to yell more, but paused and looked at Einstein. "Fine. Whatever. But no matter how much I imagine a little exit to the future, it ain't gonna appear." Mario drank the rest of his tea, forgetting about the heat of it, and nearly passed out when he did remember--which it was too late. "You don't mind if I stay here with you in the meantime, do you? With all this craziness going on...?"

"You may most certainly stay in my house," Einstein replied. "However, I daresay it may be a little noisy when I experiment."

Mario felt a little sickening feeling in his stomach, but said nothing. One of these days, he would go back. He was positive of that.


	3. Chapter 3: News To The King

"Your Nastiness!"

Bowser looked up from his steak while he sat in his throne. Kammy Koopa had scurried into the throne room. When Kammy scuttled, all was okay, and she was usually giving Bowser an update. When she scurried, something was important. Kammy Koopa was an old, female Magikoopa and the head of Bowser's army, not to mention his advisor (that he seldom listened to) and helper in battle.

"Yes, your Hagginess?" Bowser replied.

Ignoring Bowser's retort, Kammy continued. "I have just received word that Mario has been sucked into another time through a time machine!"

Bowser thought for a moment. "Whose time machine?"

"That old Prof. E. Gadd's," Kammy replied. "Apparently, he found some way to send people back in time, but has no way to bring them back! Mario is gone!"

Bowser got up and rejoiced for a few moments, then sat back down and looked at Kammy quizzically. "How do you know all this?" he asked her.

"I don't know. The writer made me say it."

"Good enough for me." Bowser stood up and paced around the room. Wonderful opportunities like this had sprung up before, but always there was a flaw. Still, with Mario gone, Peach was defenseless. "What about that wimp, whatever his name is, Luigi?" Bowser asked. "Is he still here?"

"He was never in the castle, your Horribleness."

"No! In this time! Is he still in our time, or did he leave back to the middle ages or whatever with Mario?"

Kammy looked up in thought. "No, I do not think so. But still, your Cruelness, Princess Peach is ours for the taking! It's a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity!"

"And one that I will seize!" Bowser roared. "Let's go!"

Speaking of Mario, it was nighttime where he was. Just as Einstein had said, Mario's sleep was filled with plenty of bongs, bangs, slams, explosions, hisses, and "Eurekas!" He had tried pulling the pillow over his head and snuggling as far down in his covers as he could, but it couldn't drown out the noise. So naturally, the next morning, he looked just like...well...Einstein. Bags under the eyes, messy hair and all.

"What time did you go to sleep last night?" Mario asked grumpily, not even bothering to lay his hair down. "I've lost quite a bit of valuable sleep, mind you."

"The only real valuable thing is intuition."

"Fine. But the runner up is sleep."

Mario sat down at the table he had sipped tea on before. He ran a hand through his hair, messing it up further. "Any idea how to get to the future?" he asked. "I tried thinking about it last night, but every time I thought I was going somewhere, a BOOM would disturb me." Mario gave a deep sigh. "Do you have a comb anywhere?" When the answer was no, Mario went to the nearest source of water in the house, drenched his hair, forced it to lay down, and asked if he could take a walk outside. When the answer was yes, Mario went out the door and proceeded to walk in the woods.

"How do I go back to the future?" Mario muttered aloud. "Well, I guess maybe Einstein could make his own time machine. But with this time's technology, that ain't possible. ...Maybe Prof. Gadd could fix his time machine somehow...but that would take ages! What do I do?"

"What do I do?" Luigi moaned back at Prof. E. Gadd's house. "How long will it take to fix that time machine?"

"At the rate I am going at..." the professor said, stopping his work on the time machine and thinking, "...near a week. First, I have to get the thing to work and send someone back. Then, I have to make it able to take someone forward in time again. Then I have to make it able to carry more than one person between time."

Luigi looked down at his feet. A week before he would see his brother again. "You know," Luigi said, "what were your test subjects for the time machine?"

The professor shrugged. "Sticks and rocks, really. A few wound up frazzled, but mostly nothing happened."

Luigi looked down at his feet again. He had just asked the question out of curiosity. "When you fix the machine," Luigi said, "can I be your next test subject?"

Luigi didn't realize that, a long distance away, Bowser was watching the professor's shack with growing amusement, ready to strike.


	4. Chapter 4: Klint Koopawood

"You're sure the time machine is here?" Bowser asked Kammy again.

"Positive, your Impatientness. Read any chapter to this story, and you'll see for yourself."

Bowser pulled out a little three-chapter book, peeked inside, and saw that Kammy was right.

"Okay, so, uh, what's the plan?" Bowser asked, shrugging his shoulders.

"I figured you were supposed to answer that," a raspy voice said out of somewhere.

A very tough-looking red-shelled Koopa walked into the scene behind them. He had big muscles, a tough face eternally twisted into a grimace that showed his teeth, and an old western pistol strapped to his side. He was nearly as tall as Bowser himself.

"Uhh...I believe I remember you from somewhere," Bowser murmured. "Ah, yes. That voice...that pose...you're Klint Koopawood, aren't you?"

"Some prefer to think of me as an outlaw," Klint responded, his expression remaining unchanged.

"Right...well, I say we go in, destroy the time machine, lock Mario in the past forever, and beat that pesky Luigi to a pulp if he's there," Bowser said, counting on his fingers.

"Oh, he's there," Klint said, lifting his head up a bit. "Ohhh, yeah. He's there. I can smell him..."

Bowser looked at Klint for a few more seconds, paused, then turned back around and starting marching towards Prof. Gadd's house. Klint followed after him in his swaggering walk, and Kammy scuttled after Klint.

Meanwhile, back at the shack...

Luigi was eagerly helping Prof. Gadd build the time machine. The more help the professor got, the quicker Mario would be back home. Sure, Luigi had nearly blown up the time machine, lost the wrench in the toilet, and lost his mind a few times, but otherwise, all was going smoothly.

Until the hairs on the back of Luigi's neck started standing up...

"Hey, professor, I think there's--" Luigi started to say, but a bullet through the nearest window stopped him mid-sentence and caused both Luigi and Prof. Gadd to duck for cover.

Back where Bowser was...

"Whoa!" Bowser shouted, recoiling as the first bullet went off. "I didn't think those were actual guns! I thought they were just for display or something!"

"What are ya, stupid?" Klint said in the same raspy voice as he took aim for the next bullet.

Aaaand back where Luigi was...

"We're gonna die!" Luigi shouted. He slapped himself, then yelled, "Shut up! You're not gonna die! Just be strong!"

After a brief conversation with himself that sounded like something Gollum would do (and maybe a few slaps to his own face), Luigi got back under control.

"Are there any weapons in here?" Luigi shouted to the professor.

"Screwdrivers and wrenches! That's about it!" Prof. Gadd yelled back.

They never got to get any "weapons," because the door soon blasted open, and in came Bowser.

"Party's over!" he yelled in triumph. "Now where's that time machine?"

Prof. Gadd pointed to a completely different machine in the corner of the room. Bowser, still holding his triumphant pose, strutted over to whatever machine that happened to be and swiped his fist into it. The lights flickered on and off as Bowser's skeleton flashed into view while he was being electrified. When the painful session stopped, Bowser was covered in black smudges. Smoke was being emitted from his mane.

"What are ya, stupid?" Klint repeated as he walked into the room. "I know how these fellas all work. They're all liars. I don't take well to liars." Klint held his gun up to Luigi's forehead. "So if you know what's good for you, you'll start talking." Luigi said nothing as he stared into Klint's eyes. "Do you feel lucky?" Klint rasped, still concentrating the gun on him. "Well do ya? ...Punk?"

Simply put, Luigi did not feel lucky. However, he remained completely silent. He had to protect his brother. Klint moved his gun forward, and Luigi started backing up. His head accidentally bumped into a lever. His head recoiled downward, but his hat was caught on the lever and pulled it down.

"I'd start talking right about now," Klint said, cocking his gun. He was pushing Luigi farther and farther into the time machine, knowing that all too easily it could teleport Luigi away.

"Come to think of it," Luigi said, "what do you need to know? You already know this is the time machine. What are you asking about?"

"Good point. In which case, maybe you'd like to go meet your brother. Family relationships are important."

Klint pushed a bunch of random buttons, but, as fate would have it, wound up pushing the same buttons Mario had before. He kicked Luigi into the back of the time machine, who banged into the wall and was sent flying back. Klint, who was too busy smirking, got tripped up as Luigi's leg caught him while he was flying back. Klint fell into the time machine, and he was sent back to the same time as Mario.

Ah, the world of fanfics and stories, where anything is possible, like hitting a button combination just so and being sent to the same time period as your enemy...


	5. Chapter 5: Quickdraw

AUTHOR'S NOTE: It's been awhile. This time, it hasn't been from laziness or vacations, but from the fact that I didn't want to continue the story. I'm homeschooled, and my mom wanted me to write this story as part of history (I had to learn about Einstein). It's hard to write a story when you're not the one really writing it, so eventually, it got lost off the agenda. I didn't have the heart to delete the story, but didn't want to continue this either...but I've decided now to continue anyway. Do bear in mind, though, that there won't be too many chapters left. Sometimes it's hard to pull off a lot of chapters in a story with this kind of premise and when you seem to have rushed through everything without thinking it through...

--

Mario was quite a distance from Einstein's house. The area was becoming heavily wooded now. Mario almost felt like some poor fellow in a fairy tale, walking into the woods in misery, soon to have a dark knight come and slay him...

It was only after the sixth spider web caught in Mario's face that he decided to head back. Walks in the woods were supposed to either peaceful or creepy, but not annoying. Mario let out a high-pitched, girlish scream when he noticed a large spider on his shoulder. He swore the scream made something explode; he heard it. He flicked it off and dashed back, grateful that no one was there to hear him.

Except for a Koopa...

--

Klint Koopawood was face-down in the dirt, just like Mario had been. He lifted his face up, classic grimace still on his face. He sat up and looked around the ground.

"Footprints," he muttered to himself. "The footprints of a dirtbag plumber..."

He looked up and noticed a small, shabby house in front of him. Who the heck was this person's house? Maybe a scummy little fellow had taken refuge there...

A high-pitched scream off in the woods behind him put Klint's senses on full alert. He whirled around, took out his gun, and shot in the direction of the scream on impulse. He hit nothing, but a squirrel put its hands up. Klint ignored the furry creature and wandered off into the woods, his gun out in front of him. Mario was somewhere in there. He could just tell.

--

Mario had decided what he was going to do. He was going to go back to Einstein and try to build another time machine. Sure, he didn't know how, and the energy resources were non-existent, and Einstein would problem come up with another annoying philosophy...hmm...maybe it wasn't such a good idea...

Wood splintered off of the tree next to Mario. On impulse, the plumber ducked and looked around carefully. He saw no one. A spider who had been on the tree that was shot yelled, "Don't shoot! I have 800 kids!"

Mario spotted a tiny bit of clothing peeking out from behind a tree. Was that the person who had shot at him (and the spider)? Who was that person, cocky as all get-out, shooting at a poor man lost in the woods? Some sort of hunter? Soldier? Ancient serial killer?

A head leaned out from behind the tree, and the gun fired again. Mario leaped to the side to avoid being shot. It was a Koopa! One with a strange, toothy grimace at that. Mario had seen no creatures from the Mushroom Kingdom where he currently was, so he was convinced that this murderous Koopa was from the future. Where he had come from.

Mario took off running. More wood splintered around him. A few pieces gouged him and cut him, but he continued running. A bullet came so close to killing him, it tore a hole in the back of his shirt.

_Where is the darn exit to these woods!?_ Mario thought angrily, expecting any moment now to look down and see a hole in his stomach.

Finally, light shone in. The exit! Einstein's house, to boot. Mario leaped through the clearing as a few more bullets whizzed over him. The Koopa dashed out of the clearing as well. They stared at each other for awhile.

"Do all annoying kids wander around in woods like these?" the Koopa taunted, not changing his expression or way of talking.

"Aw, don't be so hard on yourself," Mario teased back, "you can't call yourself an annoying kid."

"You've got some quick-thinking joke impulses," the Koopa smirked. "But I'm surprised. Of all the foes I have to pick a bone with, it's a plumber. Not an archaeologist. Not a tour guide to a fancy museum. Not even some lousy car salesman. You're just a greasy little plumber."

"We've all got to make a living somehow," Mario defended.

"Dyin' ain't much of a livin'."

They stared at each other for a little while more.

"I'm gonna make this fair," the Koopa said. He pulled out a magnum from seemingly nowhere and tossed it to Mario. The moment he caught it, he cocked it and blasted it at the Koopa, who had moved away in expectation of that move.

"Smart," the Koopa sneered. "But not too smart. This is gonna be an good ol' quickdraw like in the old days. I may be a dirty, rotten, lousy, son of a--"

Mario gave the Koopa a disappointed look. The Koopa looked surprised. "Oh. My bad. K rating. Well, anyway, we're gonna quickdraw."

Mario lowered his gun when the Koopa motioned for him to do so. They looked at each other the way opponents do in western movies when doing that sort of thing. Mario was going to die, and he knew it. He had never handled a gun in his life, let alone a magnum, the most powerful gun in the world, and could blow out his brains with one shot, so he had to ask himself one question.

Did he feel lucky?

He didn't feel lucky, but he WAS lucky. A bright flash behind the Koopa distracted the turtle-like creature long enough for Mario to raise his gun and fire. The Koopa flew back about twenty feet with a loud "Waaaaah!" scream that sounded completely unlike the raspy-voiced Koopa. Mario lowered his smoking gun and looked at the figure who had emerged from the bright flash.

It was Luigi!


	6. Chapter 6: There and Back Again

"Luigi!?"

Mario was overjoyed. He tossed his still-smoking gun aside and dashed over to his brother.

"What happened?" Luigi asked, eyeing the gun on the ground.

"Some weird Koopa dude came up and tried to kill me," Mario explained. "We did a quickdraw. When you appeared, it distracted him, and I, uh..."

Mario motioned to the shelled figure sprawled out on the ground behind Luigi.

"So, what happened with you?" Mario asked.

Luigi shook his head. "Wild adventure, bro. Absolutely wild. When you disappeared, I about killed the professor. We started working on it, trying to fix it to bring you back, but Bowser and that weird Koopa guy attacked us. He tried to send me back in time, too, but accidentally wound up sending himself back. So that's when he met you."

Mario nodded. "What happened to Bowser?"

"Well..."

--

Bowser banged his head every time he met a curve of the Ghost Portrificationizer's pipe. He was finally flung inside a round, metal device where he starting getting thrown around as if it was a washing machine. Maybe it was. After a few more frazzles from electricity and stomps from metal pounders, the Koopa King was defeated. By a simple device from a little professor.

--

"Oh. So he got turned into a painting?"

"No. He's not a ghost. But he DID get the beating of his life. Also, Kammy Koopa waddled in."

"What'd you do to her? Suck her into the Poltergust 3000?"

Luigi shook his head and grinned. "Would you believe me if I said we bribed her using Twinkies?" Mario shook his head no. "Well, it's true, because that's what we did. Appears the hag has a craving from little yellow puffs with cream."

Mario felt somebody behind him. He turned around and saw Einstein.

"Oh yeah," Mario stuttered, "this...this is Einstein. Happens I was sent here to him."

"Quite obviously, this young fellow is Luigi, the one who you spoke of, who must be your brother."

Mario nodded. He took another look at his surroundings. "Sorry, professor, but I've got to be going now. My brother is back."

Luigi looked a little sad. "Well, about that, bro...I think I was a little too hasty in coming here, 'cause I only heard about half of what Prof. Gadd said about bringing us back. I heard, 'remember, Luigi, the key to bringing you back is envisioning--' And then I got warped here. Sorry, bro."

Before Mario could comment, Einstein spoke up. "Imagination is more important than knowledge."

Mario looked at him strangely. "What?"

"Imagination is more important than knowledge."

Without even thinking about it, the answer clicked inside Luigi's head. "That's it!" he exclaimed. "Imagine we're back at the lab, Mario. With the professor. Go on, close your eyes."

Mario did as he was told. He made his mind completely white and blank, then filled it with the sound and image of clanking machines.

"There's the hamster, running in the wheel," Luigi added.

Mario added the running hamster in the machine to his mind.

"There's another--"

"Luigi! My boy! And Mario! You both are back, safe and sound!"

Mario opened his eyes with a start. He was in a room full of tinkering, clanking machines. A strange old man in a white coat was standing in front of him.

"I'm back!" Mario shouted happily. He turned and hugged Luigi, who had just opened his own eyes. Luigi was surprised at first, then hugged him back. The small professor chuckled beside them. Mario turned to see a pile of Twinkie wrappers on the floor next to his foot. In front of that pile was a female Magikoopa munching on a Twinkie. Mario turned to Luigi, who shrugged.

"Well, let's get out of here," Mario said cheerfully. "There's supposed to be a new episode of 'Living with Piranha Plants' on TV. Don't wanna miss it."


End file.
